Forum for Science, Industry and Business

Ice Ages and rivers may have affected gorilla diversification

11.12.2007

Geography and historical climate change may have both played a major role in gorilla evolutionary diversification, according to a new genetic study by Cardiff University and the University of New Orleans.

The collaborative School of Biosciences study shows that the genetic composition of gorilla populations varies across different parts of their current geographic range and that this variation may be tied to Ice Age climate change and river barriers.

Professor Mike Bruford, School of Biosciences said: “This wide ranging variation is a crucial consideration given the current catastrophic decline of great apes throughout Central Africa, current climate change patterns and the need to develop strategies to protect remaining populations from extinction.”

Using DNA data extracted from shed hair and faeces, the researchers found that regional differences in gorillas may have been shaped by Ice Age forest “refugia” that harboured remnants of suitable habitat and rivers that pose barriers to gorilla movement in the western Congo basin.

At high latitudes, expanding ice sheets forced some species into ice-free ‘refugia’ from which they evolved differences from one another. In contrast, the colder, drier climates experienced in the tropics led to the contraction of continuous forest into isolated pockets.

Geographic-based computer analyses also indicates that the genetic differences between gorilla populations is explained, in part, by the distance gorillas need to travel around river barriers, since in common with other large primates, they cannot cross large rivers.

Die letzten 5 Focus-News des innovations-reports im Überblick:

For the first time, a team of researchers at the Max-Planck Institute (MPI) for Polymer Research in Mainz, Germany, has succeeded in making an integrated circuit (IC) from just a monolayer of a semiconducting polymer via a bottom-up, self-assembly approach.

In the self-assembly process, the semiconducting polymer arranges itself into an ordered monolayer in a transistor. The transistors are binary switches used...

For photographers and scientists, lenses are lifesavers. They reflect and refract light, making possible the imaging systems that drive discovery through the microscope and preserve history through cameras.

But today's glass-based lenses are bulky and resist miniaturization. Next-generation technologies, such as ultrathin cameras or tiny microscopes, require...

Scientists from the University of Zurich have succeeded for the first time in tracking individual stem cells and their neuronal progeny over months within the intact adult brain. This study sheds light on how new neurons are produced throughout life.

The generation of new nerve cells was once thought to taper off at the end of embryonic development. However, recent research has shown that the adult brain...